@flowti I'd like to make clear that often there is a valid point that could be made. Ghoddess knows I'm old enough that language and values and acceptable behaviours have changed and are changing. Sometimes it's thrilling, sometimes it's the world moving very uncomfortably under your feet.

(And if this hasn't happened to you yet, don't worry, it will, your heros will prove to have feet of clay, or have been villains in disguise, or just simply mistaken. Some day you will find yourself attacked, not by those you think of as your enemies, but your own side.)

I try to stay as reasonably current as I can. Though that often involves looking back in time to get a sense of where we came from and how we got here. I suspect that many People Of A Certain Age take up an interest in philosophy and history for similar reasons.

And I know that those who are fighting the good fight, and who are battered ceaselessly on all sides, get tired, and hurt, and even broken. I've got a lot of sympathy for that.

It gets a little tough dealing with that from the outside as well, as privileged and coddled as that can sound. Even in agreement and sympathy it's possible to feel frustrated.

Which is why I try to extend good faith and ask for understanding rather than simply to challenge. While, at the same time, trying to be cognisant of what truly is evil or bullshit or legitimate bad faith.

("Assume good faith" has largely meant to me "in discussion, not necessarily at a fundamental level, and only to the point any reasonable basis for that presumption is extinguished." It's a rhetorical device, not an epistemological or moral one.)

Pick your battles.

Be kind. Everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.

https://quoteinvestigator.com/2010/06/29/be-kind/

@CptSuperlative

#quotes #values #culturalShifts